


listen before i go

by azumarheart



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Billy Hargrove Redemption, Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Character Study, Gen, Sad Ending, billy being possessed by the mind flayer and his thoughts throughout, i might write a companion piece where he does live, i wanted to make this a happy ending but it didn’t end up like that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-16
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-12-17 15:03:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21056375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/azumarheart/pseuds/azumarheart
Summary: Billy is scared. He’s never been this scared in his life.The monster stands before him.He knows what he has to do.





	listen before i go

**Author's Note:**

> I’ve been having major emotional heart pains for Billy ever since I finished season 3. I meant to make this happy but it ended up sad like canon.
> 
> I’m going to write a companion piece where it ends happy. Then maybe another sad piece with Max after. 
> 
> I’m just so sad 
> 
> Title is a Billie Eilish song. The mood fits.

Billy is scared. No- he’s terrified. He’s never felt this terrified in his life. His father’s beatings could never compare to this. This visceral, all-consuming fear that's taken over all of his systems. It’s pumping through his veins. It’s as prominent as the black sludge trailing through them too.

The creature has been in him for days. It slinks through his system, cold and slimy. It takes over his brain. Until he’s the passenger, forced to watch as he does bad things. He’s doing bad things. He’s hurting people. He doesn’t want to. But he doesn’t have much control anymore. 

He saw the girl in his room. Well, what was sort of his room. Things kept strobing from the real world to a dark, damp, scary version of the world. She stepped in front of him in flickering movements. Billy had looked up at her, and saw her open brown eyes. Concerned, scared, sad eyes. He thought he might’ve recognized her. Maybe one of Maxine’s friends. 

But he wasn’t allowed to speak. The monster was in his brain. It scared her away. But it still felt her. Still could track where she was. 

Billy was afraid for her.

Everything continued in flashes. It didn’t seem to happen in a chronological order. 

He was in a sauna at some point. It felt like his skin was boiling from the inside. And the monster inside him curled inwards, and he felt a semblance of control. In a tiny window, he could see Maxine. Her devastated expression, as he begged to be freed, and begged for forgiveness. Billy couldn’t tell that his body was moving. He didn’t notice that the monster had kept control of it. Until his fingers wrapped around a broken tile, and suddenly he was out. And the monster took over again.

He was choking the brown eyed girl. She looked so young, so fragile hanging from his fist. He tried to break free. He really did.

The kids escaped somehow. 

He remembers a play production meal with Heather’s parents. Remembers scaring off Max and the brown eyed girl. Remembers taking her parents out too.

Next thing he remembers is driving a car towards Nancy Wheeler and a car full of kids. Maxine’s red hair shone through the window, but he couldn’t pull his foot off the pedal. The monster had gotten stronger by then. 

He remembers sitting in the shower. Remembers Heather stepping in, remembers knocking her out and taking her too. 

The monster wanted the brown eyed girl. And so it let his body stalk through the halls of the mall, throw some boy and Maxine to the floor, ignoring her pleads for him to come back. 

He screamed on the inside. 

He picked up the brown eyed girl’s limp body on the outside.

Billy laid her down on the floor, as he had done with so many townspeople before her. Everyone else had felt like another piece of a puzzle. 

She was different. 

It felt like letting the monster take her would be the key to a lock. The monster was ecstatic and frantic all in one, desperate to take this girl. He didn’t understand why, but he knew he didn’t want to let her go. But he had to.

The physical monster was standing near him. Huge and fleshy and roaring. 

It was nearly time. 

But suddenly explosions were going off, and Billy had more time to buy. He pinned her down. She gazed up with those eyes. Eyes that hid nothing.

Something was truly different about her. 

Because suddenly she was in his head too. It didn’t feel like the monster. It felt more like a gentle hand sweeping away the cold tendrils the monster had laid into his skull. She was walking through his head. She was finding his memories. He could see them in tandem with her.

They made him angry. His father yelling, screaming, calling him names, smacking him. Hitting a woman. Who was the woman?

He blinks and he’s back in the mall. The brown eyes staring back at him. She’s talking. 

A beach. A sunhat. Sandals. Seagulls. A white billowing dress. Blonde hair. Waves crashing. Big smile. His name. Her eyes. 

His mother.

The girl in front of him. She knows about his mother. The girl had seen her. 

The monster locked away that memory. Billy had forgotten it even existed. The last time he felt truly, genuinely, happy.

The girl says those words to him. 

“You were happy.”

She’s crying. She’s not crying out of fear. It’s sympathy. Empathy. Pain. Loss. 

He can feel those too. 

His own eyes are pouring over with tears. He had forgotten that he was capable of being happy. He didn’t need to feel scared. He didn’t need to cower. He can do what makes him happy. 

The monster begins to get chased out of his system. He feels it pulling away. He feels himself gaining control. 

He holds onto that happy memory as he stands. Billy makes eye contact with the girl on the floor until the very last second he’s able to. 

Then he turns to the monster. 

The fireworks have stopped.

It’s ready to pounce on her.

He steps in front of her body. 

He plants his feet.

And now he’s scared. More terrified than he had been the entire past few days. 

It had all led up to this. 

The monster stands in front of him. And they’re finally on opposite sides. It doesn’t have control of his body anymore. Of his mind. He feels more clear-headed than he has in so long. He knows what he has to do.

A tentacle arm shoots out towards him. And before he can even think, he’s reaching out to grab it. It takes all of his might to hold it back. He’s screaming. He hopes the girl has made her escape.

Another two arms shoot out. And they dig into his flesh. He cries out in pain as the teeth rip him to shreds. 

He doesn’t let go.

He blinks.

Looks down.

One has shot straight through his chest. 

He coughs up black sludge. 

He falls to the floor.

He hears his name screamed from behind him.

Something happens. The monster isn’t a threat anymore. He’s staring at the shattered ceiling.

Maxine is above him suddenly. Her face is blotchy from crying. Tears are pouring down her face and she’s wailing at him. Begging him to get up. 

He’s crying too, he thinks. It’s hard to tell. Things are getting numb. He reaches out to her. His little sister.

“I’m sorry.”

It all fades to black.

It’s peaceful, at least.

**Author's Note:**

> When this was in my drafts, the title was “billy 😭” lmaoo
> 
> I have half of another fic written... but I can’t decide if I want it to be a short and sweet story or a full length long plot story. It started out short then I added so many details and dialogue that it’s getting pretty lengthy. I just love Will!!
> 
> Hopefully I can get it posted within a week or so lol


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